Pat Bean's blog

 “Life is one big road with lots of signs. So when you’re riding through the ruts, don’t complicate your mind. Flee from hate, mischief and jealousy. Don’t bury your thoughts, put your vision to reality. Wake up and live! – Bob Marley

To Route 66

1940s map showing the Santa Fe detour.

I missed a few parts of the Route 66 section I recently traveled in order to tell you about my Zion National Park adventures in a real-time scenario.

So consider the next few blogs as flashbacks.

Santa Rosa was where I left you, at the Blue Hole (May 11^th blog), if you remember.

From there it was on and off Interstate 40 to drive one or the other of the still-remaining patches of The Mother Road on the way to Albuquerque. I missed the best part of the old highway because I didn’t take the side trip to Santa Fe. I didn’t take it because of time considerations and the high cost of gas these days.

My consolation for not taking it was that on my trips between Utah, where I lived for 25 years, and Texas, where family lived, I drove this section of Route 66 dozens of times. I would suggest you don’t miss the detour if you’ve never traveled this way before. From visiting the Georgia O’Keefe Museum or the St. Francis Cathedral to simply strolling through Santa Fe’s colorful downtown, it’s well worth the time and gas.

What there was a never shortage of when I drove were May roadside flowers. — Photo by Pat Bean

My drive to Albuquerque, meanwhile, took me past Clines Corner, where a lone service station and cafe began life in the mid-1930s, the same time as Route 66 came into being.

Perseverance has turned the site, named after its original entrepreneur, Roy Cline, into a large travel center complex, complete with a huge trading post that is advertised on large billboards for miles.

It, too, was a place I had stopped at often in my previous travels – and so I simply waved my hand in its direction as I passed on by, eager to get to Albuquerque.

This largest city in New Mexico remembers Route 66 fondly – and uses it as a business and tourist gimmick.

For more than 10 miles I followed Route 66 signs, from the beginning of the town’s East Central Avenue to the end of its West Central Avenue. No boarded-up, falling-down businesses distressed me here. And I was thankful my RV, Gypsy Lee, is undersized because traffic was pretty much bumper-to-bumper.

It was actually refreshing, considering the alternative that was so visible in the many ruins that dotted most of the old highway I had traveled since leaving Amarillo. .

It left me wondering, however, how some businesses survived and some didn’t?

It would be easy to say the bigger towns had it easier – and perhaps they did. But then there were Cline’s Corner and the Midpoint Cafe that aren’t big at all. And they’re still doing well.

And that brings us back to life. What’s the difference between thriving and despairing?

Anybody have the magic answer?

Bean’s Pat: Serenity Spell http://tinyurl.com/89fpk63 A charming tale of mice and fairies. There’s too much seriousness in the world, so take a break from it. .